Biblical Archaeology Review

Piel is the intensive or causative form of a Hebrew verb. In this case the simple form of the verb qn’ is “to be jealous.” The causative or piel form, qin^e’aµh means to cause or “to incite jealousy.”

The same root no doubt lurks in Egyptian hm.t, meaning “woman” or “wife,” and in Ugaritic h\mh\mt, signifying “impregnation” or “pregnancy.”

An abashed Professor Biggs admitted to BAR that he did in fact make this statement to Science. Said Biggs: “It was an ill-considered, off-the-cuff remark, not meant seriously. It gives an entirely wrong impression of my respect for Professor Pettinato.”

The passage from Rivista Biblica Italiana reads as follows:

I. W. J. Hopkins: “The City Region in Roman Palestine,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly, January, 1980.

I. Hodder in R. A. Dodgshon and R. A. Butlin: An Historical Geography of England and Wales, London, 1978.

In these passages from the King James Version, banot is translated as towns. This is also true in the New American Standard and the Jerusalem Bible. The New English Bible translates banot as “villages” and the New International Version as “surrounding settlements.” The word translated “villages” in the King James Version (and “hamlets” by the New English Bible) is hatzar in Hebrew. Its meaning as a rural settlement of village size is not in dispute.

I have used the translation of the King James Version. Banot is also translated “daughters” in the Revised Standard Version, Jerusalem Bible and the New American Standard Bible. It is rendered as ‘villages’ by the New International Version. This interpretation, while losing something of the poetry of the traditional rendering, is, as we shall see, more accurate.